2015-08-19 BBC:巨石阵行动:被埋藏的秘密-17

 Five and half thousand years ago, Causewayed counties, like Crickley Hill and Robinhoods Bowl, were abandoned. Their decline signaled the end of large-scale hostilities¹ in ancient Britain. In the relative peace that followed, monument construction in the Stonehenge landscape began once more. With digging of huge oval ditches, the largest of which is the Greater Curses. -The largest monument in this landscape is undoubtedly² the Greater Curses. It's h* the Curses has been very, very difficult. It's only when he starts finding more detail about the architecture that he starts to get a better understanding of what is essentially³ a very, very big long banked ditch.

Over two and half kilometers long, the Curses represented a new scale of ambition for ancient engineering. It required a huge area to be cleared, before 20,000 tons of chalk were excavated⁴ to form an immense ditch. To meet these new ambitions, the builders needed tools on a previously⁵ unheard of scale, in particular flint axes.

1 hostilities   

n.战争；敌意(hostility的复数)；敌对状态；战事

参考例句：

• Mexico called for an immediate cessation of hostilities. 墨西哥要求立即停止敌对行动。
• All the old hostilities resurfaced when they met again. 他们再次碰面时，过去的种种敌意又都冒了出来。

2 undoubtedly   

adv.确实地，无疑地

参考例句：

• It is undoubtedly she who has said that.这话明明是她说的。
• He is undoubtedly the pride of China.毫无疑问他是中国的骄傲。

3 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

4 excavated   

v.挖掘( excavate的过去式和过去分词 )；开凿；挖出；发掘

参考例句：

• The site has been excavated by archaeologists. 这个遗址已被考古学家发掘出来。
• The archaeologists excavated an ancient fortress. 考古学家们发掘出一个古堡。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。